the Sky-Liners (1967) (13 page)

Right off, he started to improve both his horses and cattle by bringing in blooded stock from the States. He was not one of those who came west to get rich and get out; he came to stay and to build. The town of Malachite grew up around his trading post.

As we came riding up to the trading post, he came outside and stood on the steps to meet us, giving us a careful study. All I needed was one glimpse of Sharp to know that he was a man who would stand for no nonsense, and he certainly would not cotton to the likes of Black Fetchen.

"Mr. Sharp?" I said. "I'm Flagan Sackett, this here is my brother Galloway, and our friend, Cap Rountree. The young lady is Judith Costello."

Now, mayhap that wasn't just the way to introduce folks, but I wanted Tom Sharp to know who we were right off, for if a lot of tough strangers had been coming into the country, he would not be in a trusting mood.

He ignored me, looking first at Judith, for which I didn't blame him. "How are you, Judith? Your father has spoken of you."

"Is he all right? I mean ... we haven't heard, and those men ... "

"He was all right the last I saw of him, but that's been over a month ago. Will you get down and come in? The wife will be wanting to talk to you, and I'm sure you could all do with some food."

Whilst the rest of them went in, I led the horses to water. After a bit Tom Sharp came out, and gave a look at the horses. "Fine stock," he said. "Is that some of the Costello brand?"

"Yes, it is. We've taken the responsibility of bringing Judith out here to her pa, but there's been trouble along the way. With the Fetchens."

"I have heard of them," Sharp said grimly, "and nothing good. And it isn't the first time."

I gave him a surprised glance. "You've run into them before? You surely ain't from Tennessee?"

"From Missouri. No, it wasn't back there. A few years ago we had a sight of trouble over east and north of here with the Reynolds gang, and one of the gang was a Fetchen. They were some connection of the Reynolds outfit, I never did know what it was. The Reynolds outfit were wiped out, but Fetchen wasn't among those killed."

"Which one was he?"

"Tirey Fetchen. He'd be about my age now. He was a wanted man even before he tied up with the Reynolds gang. I'd had wanted circulars on him when I was a deputy sheriff up in Wyoming, maybe twelve years back, and I recall they listed killings back before the war. He was with the Reynolds gang during the war."

We stabled the horses, and then I went inside. The rest of them were gathered around a table eating, and that food surely smelled good.

"We've seen them come in," Sharp told us over coffee, "but not to stay around. They'd show up, then head for the hills." He looked around at me. "If they've gone up to Costello's place, he may be in real trouble."

"If Judith can stay here," I suggested, "we'll ride up and look around."

"I'll not stay!" Judith exclaimed.

"Now, ma'am," Sharp protested.

"I mean it. I have come all the way to see my father, and I won't wait any longer. I'm going with you." Then she added, looking right at me, "If you don't take me I'll go by myself."

Well, I looked over at Galloway and he shrugged, and that was all there was to it. Both of us knew there was no time to be gained arguing with a woman, and we'd both had a try before this at arguing with Judith.

She went off with Mrs. Sharp, and Sharp sat down with us. "You boys better ride careful," he said. "That's a bad outfit."

So we told him about the trip west and the loss of the Hawkes herd, the Half-Box H.

Sharp was thoughtful. When he looked up at us he said, "I'd better warn you, and when Hawkes comes along you'd better warn him. Fetchen registered a brand in his own name, the JBF Connected."

Cap chuckled. "Ain't takin' him a while to learn. A JBF Connected would fit right over a Half-Box H, fit it like a glove. If Hawkes ain't right careful he'll find all his herd wearin' the wrong brand."

I looked at Sharp. "How are folks hereabouts? Are they understandin'?"

"That depends."

"Maybe the only way we can get those cattle back is to rustle them," I said. "If he can misbrand cattle, we can just brand 'em over."

"What about that?" Galloway said. "What would cover a JBF Connected?"

"When we were ridin' through Texas," I suggested, "we saw a man down there who had a Pig-Pen brand. And I heard tell of one with a Spider-Web. They would cover most anything you could dream up."

"You would have to be careful," Sharp said. "And if you will forgive me, I would have to see Hawkes's papers on the herd."

"He's got 'em, and he'll be showing up right quick." I paused a minute, giving it thought. "What we figured, would be to sort of let the word get around. I mean, about Hawkes's herd and what he figures to do about it."

Sharp chuckled. "Now, that could be right amusing. But you'd have to move fast. It is about roundup time."

"So much the better. A lot of things can happen during a roundup. Only thing we want is to have it understood this is strictly between us and the Fetchen crowd."

"Serve them right," Sharp said. "You just wait until word gets around. You'll have the whole country on your side."

Nevertheless, I was worried. We had to get back into the hills and scout around the Costello outfit, and we had to see Costello himself, but Galloway and me, we knew that every step of the way would be a step further into trouble. Whatever the Fetchens were up to, they were also laying a trap for us, and we were riding up there, maybe right into the trap.

The more we learned, the more we had to worry about. Evan Hawkes was still far behind us, whilst the Fetchens were here, and in considerable strength. Along the line they had picked up more men, outlaws and the like.

But what was it that Black Fetchen was really after? What lay behind their move west? Had it been simply because of their killing of Laban Costello? And for revenge on us? Or was there some deeper cause that began even before we showed up? Was it something they wanted even more than Judith, more than the horses, more than Costello's ranch, if that was what they aimed for?

The thing that stuck in my mind was that Tirey Fetchen had stirred about in these parts before any of us came west, and with the Reynolds gang. Now, there was something about that ... I couldn't recall what it was, but something I'd heard about that Reynolds outfit.

They had been a gang of outlaws who passed it off that they were robbing to get money for the Confederacy, or that was the tale I'd heard. They had been caught up with, and some of them had been tied to a tree and shot. I had nothing to say about that part of it to anybody, because I wanted to recall what it was about the Reynolds gang that made me remember them ... some item I'd forgotten.

We went into the hills, climbing high up by an old Ute trail that Sharp told us of, and we skirted about to reach the valley where Costello's outfit lay.

No horse tracks showed on the trail we rode. No sound came from anywhere near. There were, of course, birds talking it up in the bushes, and a slow wind that stirred the trees as we rode along. Nothing else but once in a while the rattle of a spur or the creak of a saddle as a horse took strain in climbing, or a rider shifted weight in the saddle. Sunlight dappled the trail with leaf shadows.

We did not talk. We listened as we rode, and from time to time we paused to listen more carefully.

Cap, who was riding point, drew up suddenly, and we closed in around him. Before us was an opening among the branches of the trees lining the trail. Several miles away we could see a green valley, perhaps five hundred feet lower down, and from it sunlight reflected from a window.

"That will be it," Cap commented. "The way Sharp told it, we will be ridin' Costello range at almost any minute."

We pushed on, circling the smaller valleys that made a chain through the hills. Now, from time to time, cattle tracks showed among those of deer and elk.

The ranch, when we came upon it, lay cupped in the hills, a small but comfortable house set back on a green meadow where a stream curled through. There was slow smoke rising from the chimney, and a good lot of horses in the corrals. Sitting on the stoop in front of the house was a man with a rifle across his knees. We saw no other folks around.

In the meadow a dozen or so head of horses were grazing, the sun gleaming from their smooth flanks. It made a handsome sight, but the man on the stoop looked mighty like a guard.

Galloway sat his horse, giving study to the place, and I did likewise. "Looks too easy," Galloway said after a bit. "I don't like it."

"It's a nice morning," Cap commented. "They might just be idling about."

"Or hid out, waiting for us," I said.

We waited, but Judith was impatient. "Flagan, I want to go down there. I want to see Pa."

"You hold off," I said. "You'll see him soon enough ... when we know it's safe."

"But he may be in danger!" she protested. "They killed my grandfather, you told me so yourself."

"Yes, but it won't ease your pa's mind to have you in their hands, too. You just wait"

The valley where the ranch lay opened into another, wider valley that we could see as we moved along. There were a few cattle in the first one, and we could see more beyond. The grass was green and rich, and running down the streams there was all the snow water that any rancher could want for his stock. Costcllo had found a good place.

"They're hid out," Galloway said finally. "I have it in mind they're expecting us. No ranch is quiet like that, this time of day. Not with so many men somewhere about."

We had moved along to a lower bench among the trees, a place not forty feet from where the mountain dropped off into the valley. We saw a man come from the ranch house, saw the screen door shut behind him. From where we were, we could hear it slam.

This man, after a few minutes of talk, seated himself on the steps, while the first man went inside, apparently relieved from guard duty.

"Your pa," Cap surmised, "must be in the house. Certain sure, there's something or somebody down there to be watched over."

Nobody was saying what we had been thinking, that it would make little sense to keep Costello alive ... unless they were worried for fear some neighbor might insist on seeing him. By this time the Fetchens would know about Tom Sharp, a man not likely to be put off, nor one to trifle with. Yet time would be running out.

They might hold Costello as they had planned to hold Judith, one to be used in controlling the other. If Black Fetchen could get hold of Judith, marry her, and so establish legal claim to the Costello ranch, then Costello might be made to disappear, leaving them in control. It was a likely thing, but there was much that was puzzling about the whole affair, and about their possible connection with the Reynolds gang.

We waited under the trees, moving as little as possible, and keeping wary for fear we would be discovered. The whole thing was growing irksome, and Judith had my sympathy. Her pa was down there, and it was natural she should want to see him. Only we needed to know a few more things before we could act against them. We needed to know if Costello was alive, and how they were holding him, and we needed to know what they were after.

By now we were all pretty sure that the cattle had been incidental. They had the Half-Box H herd, and they would try to hold it, but I felt certain there was more to it than the herd, or even the ranch.

We had to wait them out. I knew they were not patient men and would soon tire of lying around in the brush, doing nothing.

"We've got to know more about this setup," I said. "Cap, do you know the story of the Reynolds outfit?"

"No more than everybody hereabouts knows. They gave it out that they were Confederate sympathizers, and began robbin' some gold trains and the like, letting it be known they were gettin' the gold to hold for the South. But most folks thought they had no such idea - not after the gold started pilin' up. They figured they planned to use it for themselves."

"What happened to the gold?"

"I can't say as I ever heard, although no doubt folks who lived round here could tell you."

"Sharp would know," Galloway suggested.

In the fading afternoon the Costello ranch looked mighty pretty. Shadows were stretching out, but down there the light was mellow and lovely. I could see why a man, even a mover like Costello, would like to settle in such a place. And there was good grazing in the hills around.

But we saw nothing of Costello, nor of anyone else at all.

The stars came out and the wind grew cool. Restlessly, I walked out to a place where the valley could be seen in more detail. There were lights in the ranch house, and shadows moved before some of the windows. Suddenly the door opened and someone went in. It was open long enough to admit two or three men.

Judith came up beside me. "Do you think Pa is down there, Flagan?"

"Uh-huh."

She said nothing more for some time, and then wondered out loud, "Why did this happen to us?"

"I reckon folks have wondered that always, Judith. In this case it's no accident, I'm thinking. Your pa or your grandpa knew something somebody else wanted to know, or else for some reason they need this ranch."